Review of Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006) by Jean C — 05 Aug 2012

I can usually stomach family movies. I've sat through just about every DreamWorks animated movie without too much trouble (even the abysmal Shrek the Third) and have even made it all the way through Doogal. Never heard of that one? You're lucky. However, sometimes a movie comes along that I really struggle with, and Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties is at that level.

After a bunch of events that aren't worth explaining, Garfield ends up in London and is mistaken for a cat named Prince, which looks just like him. The two swap places and now Garfield is royalty, but he realizes that he has to get home when the evil Lord Dargis (Billy Conolly) is planning to kill him.

The plot is just about as thin as it gets, and it's difficult to sit through at times. There are a couple of funny jokes, but entire scenes such as when Garfield leads all of the animals in a crazy lasagna cooking fest are simply painful. The number of laughs are in the single-digits, and all of the funny parts (outside of the line, "he's a bit of a tool, isn't he?) can be seen in the commercials. I wish I could say something good about the acting, but even that is poor. Bill Murray does fit Garfield's character well, but the script simply doesn't allow him to be very funny. Everyone else grates on the nerves, specifically Prince, who doesn't have a single funny line in the whole movie.

What's sad is I liked the first Gafield. Okay, I didn't like it, but it was at least bearable. This one brings the series (which quickly came to a halt due to this one) to a whole new level of bad, and I can't really recommend it to anyone. This movie is at the level of quality of some of the worse direct-to-DVD Disney sequels. Go watch Doogal instead. Just kidding.